I was given free access to a review copy of this set of videos a while ago, but I held off on actually reviewing it because it seemed very likely that they hadn’t quite posted the entire thing yet. The rest has been added now, so I can go ahead and talk about it without worrying about it being incomplete!

Bash is both probably the most popular shell for most Linux and Unix and similar systems, and also a scripting language that’s used with the shell. This set of videos focuses on the scripting part by taking you through all of the major topics that you need to write a Bash script.

You’ll have a much easier time of it if you already have some comfort with the basic principles of working on the command line. He touches very briefly on what regular shell commands do as they come up, but command line novices aren’t the target audience here and will probably be overwhelmed by how much information they would need to absorb.

The nice thing about these videos is that you’re hearing his explanations of why he’s doing everything as it happens along with the chance to see all of the interaction that’s happening with the shell and how it responds at each step. There are good written tutorials of Bash out there for free, so watching these definitely isn’t necessary for learning shell scripting. Still, if your learning style leans more toward the auditory and visual, Great Bash will be a great resource in making the topic understandable.